Study: Connecticut casinos winning big thanks to Bay Staters

While members of the state House of Representatives may not favor casino gambling, residents of the Bay State appear to enjoy the attraction.

Will Richmond

While members of the state House of Representatives may not favor casino gambling, residents of the Bay State appear to enjoy the attraction.

For the fifth consecutive year, Massachusetts residents spent more than $1 billion in the two Connecticut casinos and Rhode Island’s pair of slot parlors.

The numbers appear in the 2008 New England Gaming Update released Monday by the Center for Policy Analysis at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

“Massachusetts patronage of Connecticut and Rhode Island gaming venues remains strong and resilient,” Clyde W. Barrow, director of the center, said. “It is an extraordinary indication of Massachusetts residents’ fervor for gaming-related entertainment, hospitality and tourism in a $5 billion New England gaming market that still has about $2 billion in untapped demand outstanding.”

The fifth annual study estimated Massachusetts residents spent $846 million at Connecticut's Foxwoods Resort Casino and Mohegan Sun in 2007, while another $195 million poured into Rhode Island’s Twin River and Newport Grand. The opening of a slot parlor in Bangor, Maine, took in in just less than $2 million worth of revenue from Bay Staters.

Those numbers, according to the study, resulted in tax revenues of $117 million to Connecticut, $116 million to Rhode Island coffers and almost $1 million to Maine’s treasury.

In comparison, Rhode Islanders spent an estimated $261 million in Connecticut’s casinos and another $271 million in the Ocean State’s parlors.

With the aid of residents from the two neighboring states, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun posted $3.53 billion in total gaming and non-gaming revenues in 2007.

The study is based on a patron origin analysis that included the counting of license plate origins from vehicles parked at the four gambling destinations during a five day period in February.

The study also found more Massachusetts residents frequent Foxwoods then Connecticut habitants. Nearly eight million Bay Staters traveled to the five gambling options in 2007. Massachusetts remains the largest feeder market to New England’s casinos and slot parlors, the report states.

The frequent trips, Barrow said, resulted in the creation of thousands of jobs.

“Massachusetts visitations and spending are responsible for creating about 6,500 jobs at the Connecticut casinos and Rhode Island slot parlors,” Barrow said.

Those numbers, Barrow warned, are likely to grow as both Connecticut destinations complete multimillion dollar expansions that focus on adding non-gaming space to grab a larger share of the tourism, hospitality and convention and meetings market.

Barrow said more than 97 percent of the current expansions at both casinos are related these uses.

“(This is) a fact that should resonate with executives of every Massachusetts convention center, regional chamber of commerce, tourism council and hotel and restaurant from Cape Cod to the Berkshires,” Barrow said.